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Abstract

Acoustical and optical signal transmission underwater is of vital interest for both civilian and military applications. The range and signal to noise during the transmission, as a function of system and water optical properties, in terms of absorption and scattering, determines the effectiveness of deployed electro-optical (EO) technology. The impacts from turbulence have been demonstrated to affect system performance comparable to those from particles by recent studies. This paper examines the impacts from underwater turbulence on both acoustic scattering and EO imaging degradation, and establishes a framework that can be used to correlate these. It is hypothesized here that underwater turbulence would influence the acoustic scattering cross section and the optical turbulence intensity coefficient in a similar manner. Data from a recent field campaign, Skaneateles Optical Turbulence Exercise (SOTEX, July, 2010) is used to examine the above relationship. Results presented here show strong correlation between the acoustic scattering cross-sections and the intensity coefficient related to the modulation transfer function of an EO imaging system. This significant finding will pave ways to utilize long range acoustical returns to predict EO system performance.

Figures (6)

(left, a) Bathymetric sketch of Skaneateles Lake showing the approximate location of the two stations: S1 (red circle) near the center of the lake, and S2 (blue triangle) in the northern end of the lake. Map from http://www.ourlake.org/html/skaneateles_lake1.html. (right, b) Temperature profiles corresponding to the dissipation profiles shown in Fig. 2-6 for deployments on July 27 day (solid red), July 28 day (solid green), July 29 day (solid blue), July 29 night (dashed purple), July 30 day (solid black). All profiles are from S1 except for the July 29th daytime deployment, which is from S2.